Occupy DC seeks help against eviction

Occupy DC has gone to a court to forestall any police attempt to demolish its encampment in McPherson Square, a park near the White House. In a plea for a US District Court ruling, the protesters said on Wednesday that it would be unlawful to dismantle their tent city since the National Park Service police did not have proper procedures to seize, store, and return property. "It's an application for an order to prevent the eviction of Occupy DC on McPherson Square," lawyer Jeffrey Light said. The activists also stress that, if proper procedures are created, they could be applied against specifically-targeted property and not to the entire encampment in the K Street lobbying district. Over the past couple of months, the police have broken up Occupy encampments in cities and towns across the US and arrested dozens of protesters. Occupy DC, which will commemorate its 100th day on Sunday, is part of the Occupy Wall Street movement that emerged after a group of demonstrators gathered in New York's financial district on September 17, 2011 to protest, among other things, against the excessive influence of big corporations on the US policies as well as the unjust distribution of wealth and the high-level corruption in the country There have been 5,800 arrests during Occupy protests in cities across the US up to December 31, 2011, according to the website occupy-arrests.com. Despite the crackdown, the Occupy movement has now spread to many major US cities as well as to Australia, Britain, Germany, Italy, Ireland, Portugal, and other countries. The worldwide demonstrations have taken issue with unemployment, war, and corporatism.